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A Mother’s Plea

Part 2 in the continuing saga known as Love Letters to Jack* (Dorsey) in which Twitter emerges from bird puberty and tries to grow in spite of “parental” interference.

So, Jack, remember back to your adolescence. When the cool crowd ignored you because of your nerdiness. But they sure didn’t call you bird-brain, did they? Because you’re soooo smart—a nerd among nerds. Hard on your adolescent ego, though—right?

Junior is having feelings of worthlessness, isolation, loneliness. He’s not winning any popularity contests, Dad. Pew Research Center just informed the whole world that he’s #7 behind YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat, and LinkedIn. How do you think that makes him feel? I am seriously concerned for his self-esteem. We need to get our relationship back on track and help him, Jack.

True, you and I have this major age difference, but it could actually work in our favor. I mean, if you pool all your millennial friends (73 million, per the U.S. Census Bureau) and I pull in my baby-boomer friends (72 million, ditto the source), OMG! We could double Junior’s flock! So, let’s look at how we can do this.

First, make it easier for my community of 72 million to understand the platform. I mean, it doesn’t have to be this hard! Look how we all embraced Facebook (the second most popular social media site, need I remind you?)—like a duck takes to water.

And then—stop changing things around all the time! After you make the platform easier to negotiate, give us some time to absorb the changes. Now, I know your little techie worker bees come in every morning thinking, “Let’s see how esoteric we can make things today,” and we don’t want to spoil their enthusiasm. But how about giving awards for simplicity, not obtuseness? Let this become your mantra: How. Can. We. Make. Twitter. Easy? Repeat, over and over and over.

Trash the diagrams and flow-charts. How about beta testing things on someone over 30? Better yet, over 55—they’re the ones with money to spend. Which brings me to advertising. Wait, what advertising?

Yes, Jack, in the immortal words of Shoeless Joe Jackson, “If you build it, he will come.” Sports, advertising—it’s all about money. Build a better Twitter, and the advertisers will beat a path to your door